


The Persistance of Certain Memories

by Katharos



Category: xxxHoLic
Genre: Gen, outside pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-24
Updated: 2009-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-05 04:12:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/37689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katharos/pseuds/Katharos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An original character remembers Clow and Yuuko, and muses on the effect their loss has had on the magical community. Outside perspective, whee!</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Persistance of Certain Memories

I think on them more often these days, despite my many firm resolves. I have been given reason, I suppose, but there is a tenor to these remembrances that any wizard who has reached my years should recognise. Why do they intrude so persistently into my thoughts now? Then again, that was not a quality they ever lacked.

I can remember the first time I ever saw them; it was at a house party thrown by a witch of some renown, and I was an awed apprentice, banished from my master's side for stepping on his heels, and lurking from corner to corner in an agony of nerves. I slipped into the library to dodge a servant carrying the wine and that's when I saw them; seated at one of the old oak tables, their heads bent together over some obscure magical tract as they argued furiously over its discourse. Both agreed that the author was an idiot; it was precisely where he diverged from sense that was in dispute. Their hair fell down their backs like twin strokes of black ink, and they sat so close together it met, as if to form some character I could not read.

I lingered in my shadowed nook, listening, fascinated. I was far enough advanced in my own studies to follow the terms they used with little difficult, but as far as understanding what they meant by them! Even so, I learnt more in that hour's eavesdropping than I had in a month's dull conversation with my books. I was so absorbed, in fact, that I didn't notice the servant that had come to fetch me to table until it bit my ear, which made me jump and yelp, and sent the sprite fluttering off in a huff. The two figures at the table paused in their argument for the first time and turned to regard me, with no expression of surprise and with matching smiles. And my stomach attempted to crawl underneath the floor.

Then they asked me my opinion of the text they had been discussing and I stuttered my way through some clumsy apology for eavesdropping before Clow informed me, gently, that they wanted to hear my own thoughts, and thus reassured I managed something approaching intelligent.

That was always the thing with Clow; Yuuko at least let you know when she was teasing you, but I have seen Clow send dignitaries home still ignorant of the fact that they had been thoroughly mocked. I came to realise later that they were kind to me, in our first conversation. Still, I was blushing, conscious of the honour they did me by including me in their conversation, and it is a wonder I did not combust when a servant came seeking where we were; everyone was waiting on us.

By some great stroke of luck I was seated opposite them at table. At least, I attributed it to luck then. Later, I learned that around them luck had such a history of swaying to their desires that it might have almost been another of Clow's cards.

After that they invited me to their houses many times, invitations I always eagerly accepted, and with my master's full approval while I was still under his aegis. Clow especially had a library that far outweighed any other I have ever known; not in number, but in the depth of knowledge in contained. But what tutelage they gave me came not through books, which were a pleasure for quiet evenings, but through discussion in which they always invited me to take a part. They were as merciless to me as to each other, but even Yuuko's worse mockings held a grain of truth which, if I were quick enough, I could leap upon and build into a pearl, and any depth or subtlety of mind to which I am now accorded, I give all credit to those discussion that pinned me and twisted me and forced me to soar.

There was always the danger, however, that they would drift into some contentious side track far above my level of understanding, and become so involved in tearing each other's positions to shreds that they would forget I was there. I didn't mind; listening to their arguments was always a pleasure in itself, and if it looked likely to continue past the point at which I'd starve to death one of the Guardians, usually Yue, would bring me meals.

When Clow died I wept, and made the same offerings I had made for my official master. I looked for Yuuko then, but she had vanished and eventually I came to my senses long enough to stop

We lost something then, with his death and her retreat from the world of our society; a golden age, perhaps. The children who have come of age since then can't understand it, but they weren't bright stars or moons or even suns among us; they were the darkness in which the rest of us were set. A luxuriant darkness, laughing with hints of mysteries our own faint lights of magic and knowledge couldn't hope to uncover but we tried to anyway, straining after them, and we shined the brighter for it.

Now we are scattered, little crumbled heaps, stark and exposed under a cold clear light; there's still a few great families, slowly collapsing inwards on themselves, but most of us are like hermit crabs; shut up in our houses, building our libraries up around us and staring back into the past in our search for the magic that has faded; that we somehow missed the going of. Where my shelves used to groan under a multiplicity of new journals, now almost every paper published is an analysis of some dead magician's work.

I'm old now, old and filled up with years and wrinkles and knowledge, and even though many account me wise, I think I can claim a small measure of wisdom for myself. So when a young student came requesting access to my library I threw open its doors to him, to the general astonishment of the archaeological community, whose blandishments and abject begging I have steadfastly withstood for years. If I admit I found such a response somewhat pleasing, I am only being a credit to my teachers.  
And when that same student came to look up to me as a mentor I was able to smile at the humour of it, and not just feel the pain.

It is the same smile I saw on their faces so many, many times, as I grew from apprentice to journeyman to master in my own right in the eyes of the community, though always an amusing boy to theirs. And I never understood, until I felt it on my own.

I smiled again the other day; I had gone into town to buy some cat's whiskers and I saw Yuuko striding between the stalls, wearing an outfit I last saw her wear a century ago and which is just now coming into fashion. Her face was young, as young as it was so long ago when I stumbled into a darkened room and saw her head and Clow's inclined together, as if to make an arch that might hold up worlds.

A boy followed her, staggering under the weight of the bags strung across his shoulders, seething resentment in every line of his body. Her head was half turned back over her shoulder as she walked so she could address him, and by his face I can guess that address had more than a little of taunt in it.

Fearless, wilful, he snapped back and she laughed at him, and that is when I found myself smiling again. The boy was clearly young, with the young's certain opinions untried by time and experience. But I know well the value of a good mentor in hastening that seasoning and I believe, in some little while, Yuuko will find a worthy argument in him.


End file.
